


Breakfast Time Banter

by NorthwesternInsanity



Category: Music RPF, Winger (Band)
Genre: Boys Being Boys, Fluff, Gen, Teasing, banana phones
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-15
Updated: 2018-05-15
Packaged: 2019-05-07 05:21:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,608
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14664147
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NorthwesternInsanity/pseuds/NorthwesternInsanity
Summary: "Have you two gone bananas?" "You know we're doing something right with each other if we've reached the point where we can play with our food and make a scene in a restaurant and not embarrass each other." The guys engage in playful teasing and goofing off at breakfast on the road a couple of months into their first tour. Nothing but a bunch of humor and fluff.





	Breakfast Time Banter

**Author's Note:**

> Done on Rockfic for the May 2018 comedy challenge. Because I was tickled by the idea of grown men doing banana phones, and only Winger could pull it off in an average situation!

Paul shook his head and grinned at Reb across the table in the restaurant they had chosen to stop at for breakfast along the road. Reb was nudging Kip and looking toward the back of the dining room where the door to the kitchen was.

"Our waitress is about to start making rounds; please figure out what you want within a year this time."

Rod, who sat on the other side of the table with Paul, peered over the rim of his coffee mug.

"Maybe you don't want to distract him while he's trying to figure it out, Reb?"

Kip smirked and looked up, feigning innocence. "I don't know what you two are talking about."

Reb groaned, then chuckled when Kip reached over and slammed the back of his hand into his upper arm.

"Ouch!"

"I'm just messing around -even if you're probably not. You know, I have told you you can do it back to me."

"And I don't want to do that and hurt you." Reb looked down to the table bashfully, then mimed falling over as Kip mimed striking again. "I just don't want us to take too long when we're on a schedule to be somewhere."

Reb had gotten better about it, but being the only one who had never truly been on a tour prior to Winger, and feeling most comfortable knowing where and when everything was going to happen, he still was the worrier of them, especially when he didn't know what time it was or how long something would be.

"We're all leaving together," Rod assured. "I don't think the bus is gonna go driving off without us, Reb. It would be pretty silly of the driver."

"And we got more than enough time to get to where we're going, so there's no need to worry about numbers on a clock until we get there. Not even right away after we get there." Kip helped Reb up. "We're taking our time and enjoying it today."

"Timeless day, as Alice would call it. Only three official times -prep-time, stage time, and downtime. Otherwise, just go with the flow and have a good time," said Paul, before glancing behind Reb and Kip as the waitress walked up. "I think it's time to order, if that's the only other official time there is!"

"You all go ahead first, and I'll be ready when you all get done," Kip declared with a shrug.

After nearly ten painstakingly long minutes, more than half of which were taken by Kip's indecision, the waitress finally left the table side with orders, leaving a fruit basket with them until everything else was ready.

"Kip, for crying out loud," Reb groaned, letting his forehead hit the table as soon as she was out of sight. He came up and ran his fingers through his bangs to fluff them back up from where he'd pressed them flat against the table.

Kip raised an eyebrow and gave his best innocent look again. "Who, me?"

"Yes, you! One would think having been a waiter yourself you'd try not to hold one up like that. You know..." Reb looked up to the ceiling as if deep in thought and swallowed to force his voice down to its lowest octave. "I think that maybe... no, actually... I guess I'd like a bran muffin ...Got any... grapefruit?"

Kip chuckled, only looking somewhat bashful over it.

Paul reached across the table and poked Kip playfully. "Just remember, I was on the road with him for over a year, you're only coming up on two months of full time on the road, Reb."

"Who knows, Reb; maybe he's doing it to get back at all the people who may have done that to him," suggested Rod.

"That's evil!" Still refusing to completely whap Kip in the arm, Reb put his fingertips on Kip's shoulder and pushed until he listed over on the bench.

"Rod, no." Kip grinned harder and shook his head. "Come on; I'm not _that_ evil!"

"Or, maybe he was just stalling to have a chance to check her out," whispered Paul.

Reb's eyes bugged under his bangs as Paul's comment set the whole table off in giggles.

_"Oo-oo_ -ooh!" Rod covered his mouth in an attempt to not look conspicuous to people at other tables across the room, then reached behind Paul and clapped him on the back. "Paul!"

Whether Kip had been or not, he now had the naughtiest smile on his face as he laughed the hardest of all of them. He was even blushing ever so slightly, not being the kind to blush easily

"Well, if he wasn't before, now that you encouraged him, he will be." Reb sent a teasing look toward Kip, and doing so far more readily, he was blushing quite a bit. "Great going, Paul!"

"I could see it now. He'll check her out, maybe try subtly flirting with her -and if she picks up on it..." Paul grinned mischievously and picked up a banana. He held it to his ear like a phone. "Hello, operator?"

Kip slapped his hand on the seat beside himself and flopped back wheezing. Unable to speak, he weakly lifted it back up to point at Paul.

_"Paul!"_ Rod scolded again, hardly believe what he was seeing.

Paul elbowed Rod sitting next to him. "Come on, you gotta be operator for me!"

"Oh boy, here we go." Rod flipped his head forward into his hands. However, when he came up, he too picked up another one of the three bananas on the table and held it to his ear. "New York City public call."

"Hi, if you could give me..." Paul gave a random sequence of numbers.

"Okay, if you could stay on the line; I'll have it in a moment." Rod held the banana he had just above the table next to his napkin and mimed dialing on it.

Paul reached back for the fruit basket and passed a third banana over to Reb as Rod 'dialed'.

Taken aback, Reb looked at Rod and Paul as if they'd lost their minds, setting both of them off.

"Have _you_ two gone bananas?" he whispered.

Paul waved at the basket. "Just play along with it! You're better suited for it than Kip anyway."

Reb's cheeks were now every shade of red, and he was laughing too hard to sit up straight, let alone speak.

"Hello?" asked Paul.

"Y-yeah? Who's this?"

If Reb had any hope of keeping it together while Paul tried to imitate Kip on the phone, it was killed as Rod 'hung up' by putting the banana on his head so that it balanced there.

He doubled over the table and laughed until he nearly slipped over sideways to fall over across Kip's lap, still holding his 'phone' while Paul pulled his away from his head and looked at it as though whoever on the other end had lost their mind.

Kip put his arm down across Reb's back affectionately and pointed at Paul again.

"Your _face!_ Paul, your face!"

"Hello?" asked Paul, his lips twitching and his voice trembling as he tried to keep serious and in character with confusion. "Hello? Are you there? ...No?"

"Guys, waitress alert," warned Rod, taking his banana off his head as he saw the door in the back of the dining room open.

"Okay, bye I guess. Not sure what this is all about." Paul put his phone down with a perplexed expression as Reb put his down too and tried to act like he had just been looking at the TV across the room and had seen something funny until the waitress put everything else on the table and left.

"Oh, are we still going?" asked Reb as Paul picked up his banana again and mimed a dial, gestured to Rod, who grinned sheepishly and also resumed his phone position.

"Hey, Rod, did you hear Kip called that girl from the diner the other day? Should we call and ask him how it went?"

"Paul, don't dig." Rod tried to sound mournful at Paul's curiosity and looking for trouble, but his smile was derailing the whole act, and it was ten times as funny as if it had been for real.

"Come on, Rod, you know you want to know too."

"Alright, Paul, alright." Rod sighed dramatically as part of the rueful act. "You got me, and if we don't, I know you will anyway on your own."

Reb nudged Kip, offering him the banana he had.

"No thanks; you use that and be on the same line with me," said Kip.

"But, how are you going to...?"

Kip picked up his grapefruit in one hand, reached across the table, dumped the sugar packets out of the small holder, and held the two like the separate pieces of an old-fashioned hook phone -the holder by his ear and the grapefruit just in front of his chin, rendering Reb unable to speak again.

"Hey, Kip, how'd it go with getting that girl from the restaurant on the phone the other day?"

"You know, that's an interesting question. Because I got her -I'm pretty sure -but we didn't get a single word through. Not sure if it was a bad connection, but it sounded like she was laughing, and she wouldn't show any sign she could hear me."

"What's going on where you are now, Kip?" asked Paul, gesturing with his 'phone' as though he heard Reb laughing in the background. "You say hysterical laughter was all you could hear -I can hear you, but I hear someone just about dying behind you-"

As Paul made that remark, across the dining room, another waiter dropped a basket of utensils, creating a huge crash. At the same time, another table down the way that appeared to be a bunch of sports fans decked out to go to a game later looked over and started clapping and cheering.

"Ooohh..." Kip moaned and looked down to the table, trying to hold back laughter and blushing for real this time, knowing well enough the embarrassment of a situation that was funny to everyone but the waiter it had happened to. Poor guy, he mouthed, shaking his head.

Having less willpower, Reb snorted, causing Paul to nearly crack up while he tried to stay in with the scenario.

"Oh my goodness, it s-sounds like you're h-having a p-party!"

Unable to hold back any longer, Kip guffawed loudly so that a few people across the dining room turned their heads to see what was going on their way. It was hard to tell if he was laughing so much at the utensils, Paul's remark, or at Paul struggling to say it.

Reb whimpered painfully through his hysteria. He had pulled the end of his banana further from his ear and over his mouth to try and hide how hard he was laughing from across the room, despite being plenty of a spectacle from holding a banana to his head in the first place.

"S-s-st-op i-it!"

"Well, I don't know if you could call it a party," Kip strained, "but we're definitely having a good time! No, Reb and I are here on the other phone with Rod -and Reb is trying..."

He trailed off as Rod and Reb dissolved again and took him with them.

"...a-and Reb is t-trying... t'stop laughin' ...an' we just can't pull it together; all three of us!" Kip regained control of his speech and breathed deeply as Paul lost it, still miming being on the other end of the phone. "Whoooo! Now all four of us that you're on the line too!"

"I can't take it any longer; Kip, I don't know how you're not in pain!" Reb broke character and hung up by putting the banana over the top of his head, before taking it down and leaning back in his seat to laugh and hold his stomach as he did so. Seeing someone else break before him, Rod followed suite, hanging up and fanning himself. He had tears in his eyes and he was red in the face more from exertion than from embarrassment.

"Whew, it's hot in here! That was too perfect!" Seeing Rod overheating from laughing got Kip slapping the table again.

"You're usually pretty good at holding character, Reb, but I think we got you good today!" Paul looked rather pleased with himself as everyone was now officially hung up and Kip was struggling to put the sugar packets back in the holder with his arms still weak from hysteria.

"Look, I can't take it seriously when he-" Reb pointed to Rod, who cracked up again to Kip and Paul's great amusement, "-has a banana on his head. And please, give me a moment before you do something like that again -my stomach! It hurts _so bad!_ "

"Oh, so does mine." Having settled down enough to do so without choking, Kip took a long drink of coffee and sighed as he recuperated. "You know we're doing something right with each other if we've reached the point where we can play with our food, make a scene in a restaurant, laugh until it hurts, and not be completely embarrassed with each other."

Rod shook his head and wiped his eyes before settling down to finally eat his food.

"That's better than waking up with a cup of coffee beside the bed, and I have never woken up with a cup of coffee beside me before!"

"Oh my gosh; oh my gosh." Paul held his ribs and breathed deeply. "That was good."

"Everyone alright?" Reb asked when enough time had passed to trust that the question wouldn't start the madness back up again."

"Yeah, we're good as long as you are, Reb, and if we need anything else, we'll have to settle it at the table, because Paul doesn't have a phone anymore." Kip pointed to Paul, who by now had peeled and was halfway finished with his banana, rendering it useless to use for phone charades.

Paul sighed. "You know, we're good, but we still never figured out the answer as to whether you were checking that girl out or not!"

Reb set his glass of orange juice down and swallowed hard before he could crack up and choke. "Oh, not again!"

"You will never know." Kip smirked.

"Just give it up, Paul," said Rod. "Well, if nothing else, we sure all got a load of fun out of her, whether she knew it or not -and that's good enough for me!"

"Until Kip flirts with her for that," Paul cracked. As second later, he yelped as Rod reached over and slid an ice cube down the back of his shirt.

"Alright, whether I'll flirt with her or not, I'll have to give it to her for leading to that. Reb actually shoved me and Rod, I didn't think you had it in you!"

"We had some crazy moments in Dixie Dregs too," Rod admitted. "We never did banana phones, but if it were one of the guys there, one of you all here might have had entire glass of juice over your head by now, and even that would have been in good fun. After a couple of months, it gets monotonous on the road -you have to be a little crazy to keep from getting bored."

"So if it's a timeless day and only classified by general schedule points, there's prep-time, stage time, downtime," Reb paused to make sure he wasn't forgetting one of Paul's points, "and everything else is just craziness."

Kip grinned. "Welcome to long-term life on the road!"


End file.
